2003-07-14 04:00:00 PDT Ramallah, West Bank -- A mob attacked an eminent Palestinian political scientist Sunday as he tried to announce a survey indicating that only a small minority of Palestinian refugees say they would use the "right of return" to Israel if it were gained as part of a peace agreement.

The political scientist, Khalil Shikaki, the director of the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in Ramallah, intended to discuss for the Arabic-language news media the tensions and complexities of Palestinian society the survey touched on. Instead, struck, shoved and pelted with eggs, but not seriously injured, he wound up starkly illustrating them.

Shikaki said the dozens of rioters, who came prepared with their own news release, were hijacking his news conference as a signal to the Palestinian prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas.

"They are trying to send a message that the right of return is sacred, and that you who are negotiating are on notice," said Shikaki, who is a refugee himself.

Yasser Arafat, the Palestinian leader, has accused Abbas of botching negotiations with Israel on a new American-backed peace plan. The two leaders have not spoken to each other since Abbas threatened to resign in an argument last Monday night.

"People are taking sides," Shikaki said. "The accusations are flying, and no one is being civil."

The rioters marched from Shikaki's office to Arafat's compound a few blocks away, where he received them. It was not clear whether he knew what they had done.

The violence sprang from tension over the right of return, perhaps the deepest divide between Palestinians and Israelis.

Palestinians who fled or were driven from their homes during the Arab- Israeli war of 1948 claim a right to live in what is now Israel. Israel rejects the claim, fearing that Palestinians hope to achieve by demographics what they have failed to do by force of arms -- erase Israel's Jewish character. Palestinian refugees and their descendants now number about 4 million, while Israel has about 5 million Jewish citizens and 1 million Arab citizens.

In a broad, detailed survey, Shikaki's researchers questioned 4,500 refugee families living in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, Jordan and Lebanon. More than 95 percent of them insisted that Israel recognize a right of return, accepting the Palestinian position in principle, he said.

The researchers then presented five options for refugees, including financial compensation and moving to a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza. The options were based on those negotiated but never formally endorsed by Israel and the Palestinians in January 2001, and they assumed that Israel recognized a right of return.

But only 10 percent of those questioned demanded permanent residence in Israel, a proportion that decreased if the refugees were told that they would have to take Israeli citizenship or that their old homes were gone.

More than half -- a total of 54 percent -- said they would accept compensation and homes in the West Bank and Gaza, or in land ceded by Israel in a swap from some West Bank land, Shikaki said. Others said they would elect to stay in their host country or go to another country.

Thirteen percent rejected any deal at all.

The survey had a margin of error of less than three percentage points, Shikaki said. It did not encompass the roughly 10 percent of Palestinian refugees who live in Syria, where researchers generally face government restrictions.

Shikaki said that the poll's results showed that refugees were less interested in being nationalist standard-bearers than in living fuller lives.

"This is a slap in the face for all of us," he said, referring to the results. "Refugees are human beings with needs. These people want to live their lives."

Shikaki earned his doctorate from Columbia University and now directs the polling organization in Ramallah. For his independent views, he has been threatened by both Arafat and the Islamic group Hamas, because his polls have at various times shown their popularity to be sinking.